In the twelve-month stretch from October 2022 through September 2023, 30,000 people died while waiting for federal disability determinations, according to Social Security Commissioner Martin O’Malley. Martha asked Harris what she would do as president for people, like herself, who are waiting for disability decisions while in desperate need of health insurance.
Delays in those decisions, driven in part by understaffing and a Covid-related rise in disability rates, have driven the typical wait time from four months in 2019 to seven months today, often coupled with the need to appeal an initial rejection, which can take years. The processing times represent a mounting crisis for the more than 1 million Americans who apply for disability in a given year.
I managed to get on SSDI after fucking years, before Covid, and guess what, I still can’t afford anything beyond roach motel / slum lord housing (which of course have bad water and mold and dust, and because these places don’t have a 3x rent as income requirement)…
…, and I can’t actually access medical care, as I can’t afford a car and public transit is basically non existent, and even if I could, it would take me a year of referrals and tens of thousands of dollars to access the PT care I need.
Its literally 100x easier and less expensive for me to just learn the PT I need to do from reading studies and watching youtube videos from actually qualified people.
If you get on SSDI, if you make more than about 1500 dollars a month, for 9 consecutive months, then your SSDI benefits go away, poof, all gone, until you have 0 income for another 9 months.
During which time you will be evicted and likely die on the streets as a disabled homeless person.